Category: Everything Political

This records the presentation of my petition to Parliament: the Petition of Morgan Davie and 86 others requesting that the House of Representatives urge the Government to sign and ratify the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance as quickly as possible. (I blogged about this petition previously.)
You might wonder, how could I possibly squeeze in the time to organise a petition while preparing for a wedding, studying, working, and blogging far far too much?
The answer, of course, is I didn’t. I heartily endorse the message of this petition, and I was pleased to put my name to it, receive correspondence, and otherwise be the front-person, but it is not even remotely mine. This petition is entirely the hard work of doughty freedoms-fighter Idiot/Savant of No Right Turn.
It will be some time before the select committee reports back on the petition, but whenever that should happen, you’ll hear about it here as well as at NRT.
[edit: hello, NRT readers. Yes, I am the beard of idiot/savant. Or, perhaps, the Groucho Marx nose-moustache-and-glasses.]

My earlier post about protests at the RNC included this photograph:

Over at Making Light, they found a reverse of the same shot:

This illustrated a guest post about the protests that is well worth a read – particularly for the reminders of the propensity for law enforcement agencies to insert informers and agents provocateur into protest groups. (NZers will be well-acquainted with recent embarrassments to an energy company where protest-group infliltrators were exposed; ML links also to this photograph, which suggests dirty pool – and down in comments you see the suspicion of infiltration was later confirmed.
It all just makes a messy story messier. I doubt you need police agents to get Black Bloc vandalism – Occam’s Razor would suggest “young men + testosterone” is a better route to that outcome. And I furthermore am convinced that many in the Black Bloc are very thoughtful and insightful people, who would disagree with me vehemently when I say much of what they do is strategically disastrous. Add in the points made by commenters to the previous post, and it is clear there are no simple answers here.
Luckily I’m just a blog, so I don’t need to do “answers”, I can just claim that my entire purpose is to make you think, or at least, to entertain you. And to that end, here (courtesy again the Knifeman) is Rage Against The Machine putting on a show a capella after being refused permission to play at the RNC protests…

As a citizen of the rest of the world, man, I gotta say, that Obama guy you got in your election race can sure deliver a hell of a speech. The acceptance speech at the Denver convention? That is a thing of beauty. Almost enough to make us rest-of-worlders start to hope.
(Any of my fellow rest-of-worlders who haven’t encountered the speech yet, you can find video and transcript here – this thing is seriously worth your time.)
And this is, what, the third? fourth? incredible speech by Obama during this campaign, speeches for the ages that will be studied in schools for decades or longer. And the speeches aren’t just wind-up toy messages, they are the product of the man and his campaign. This is the guy the Dems want you to vote for.
And on the other side of the ballot paper? John McCain, who is basically a missile in a rumpled suit, and who managed to snatch the media eye away from Obama the only way he could, with a completely frikkin’ insane nomination decision for his VP. I mean, Sarah Palin? This is his counterpoint? Its such a wacked-out move that it doesn’t even make sense on its own terms. Is she meant to grab the Clinton voters? Seriously, you figure a fundy Christian anti-abortion hardliner is going to win over disgruntled feminists?
Then again, this is the US, and up is usually down over there. Political engagement there has advanced further from rationality than in any other first-world nation (though most of the others are racing to catch up, it must be noted). Just hold it in your head for a moment – the truly insane thing is that in the US, a country economically wounded, deeply corrupted and compromised, locked in a tortuous unwinnable war, in this country there will be an election between Barack Obama and John McCain – conjure up the images in your mind, these two men, and all that they represent – there will be an election between these two men, and John McCain has a good chance of winning.
It doesn’t make the slightest lick of sense, but I’ll tell you this: it makes for one hell of an interesting show.

[Starting to get back into the groove of life. There may be blog.]
This one I got wrong: “There is a moral dimension to the Olympics, and I expect it to come to the fore in Beijing. It won’t be the first time there’s been a memorable protest under the five rings.”
There was barely a murmur of political protest from the athletes during this Olympiad. I am still surprised, given the massive conflicts that raged over the torch run, and the widespread awareness and popularity of the Tibet cause if nothing else. It was as if everyone who turned up just wanted to do their sporty and enjoy the atmosphere in the Olympic village! (Cue the usual run of media stories about how everyone is shagging everyone else in athlete-town.) Where, I ask, was their political consciousness?
In retrospect it isn’t so surprising. It is absolutely clear that China put on a wonderful Games, and the athletes were entirely caught up in it, with helpful people everywhere and a massive enthusiasm from the locals to show off their country to the world and win many, many medals. It was a brilliant games to watch, as well – any games that gives you both a Michael Phelps and a Usain Bolt is one to be cherished. Like so many other people, I don’t really give a toss about 99% of the Olympic sports at any other time, but the festival nature of the Olympics and the sheer global commitment to excellence gets me every time.
So I can understand any athlete with a political mission letting it slide in the face of this excellent welcome. For an athlete at this level, the politics can only ever be distantly second to the sport, and its easy to see that distant second fading away into obscurity. So it turned out to be a happy games, despite the occasional sour note that reverberated with deeply unpleasant power – the lip-synch little girl for one. Media in the UK didn’t shy away from hinting at China’s political failings, but also never went beyond insinuation. Everyone walked away exhilirated and smiling, and in fact there is something deeply encouraging in the embrace of the Chinese by the world when so often they are vilified or even feared in other countries.
This, then, was China’s coming out party into the 21st century world with a new social prominence to match its economic and political prominence. The Beijing Olympiad shows, unnervingly, just how functional a massive oppressive state can be when it marries itself to global capital. This is a model of the future; unlike Soviet Russia, whose communism was probably destined to collapse in upon itself sooner rather than later, China shows no cracks and I can fully believe it will be standing strong with this exact model of state management in a century’s time, or longer. It has embraced the systems in the rest of the world that don’t care about human rights, and in so doing has immunised itself from those systems that do care. It has had its coming out party, and it won’t be going inside again.

In December 2006, the United Nations adopted a major new human rights treaty aimed at preventing and punishing enforced disappearance.
New Zealand didn’t sign it.
You can help change this.

NZ political blogger Idiot/Savant of No Right Turn has launched a short, sharp campaign to petition the government to sign.
Unsurprisingly, given my affection for Amnesty International as a favoured charity, I support this goal wholeheartedly. I would really appreciate it if you download a copy of the petition, walk it around your workplace and get folk to sign it.
If you’ve never felt entirely up to speed on political disappearance and “the disappeared”, there’s a good overview on wikipedia. The list of places with well-known incidents includes Iran, Nazi Germany, Chechnya and Northern Ireland. It is a practice that undermines the most basic aspects of being human, let alone its terrible consequences for freedom and human rights. I believe the government should become a signatory to this new treaty.
I/S has set up a page for the campaign with further information.

More from the amusing circus that is NZ politics and media: front page of the newspaper of our capital city, The Dominion Post, is this article by Phil Kitchin. Key quote:

Contacted for comment yesterday, Winston Peters said: “Phil, I told you I’m not talking to a lying wanker like you. See you.” He then hung up.

Foreign types might ask, who is Winston Peters? He is our nation’s Foreign Minister. He is the dude we send to meet the dignitaries. He shakes the hand of your President or Prime Minister, he is that guy, and that is how he rolls here. Ooh yeah.
New Zealand is very proud.

Many Wellingtonians will now have heard that friends-of-this-blog Dave and Urs were at the Knoxville, Tennessee church that was attacked by a man with a gun a few days ago.
The man wrote a letter claiming that he was attacking the church because liberals and gays were destroying the country. While there is certainly more to the story, it is clear that the rhetoric of the right-wing media provided him with a structure and a rationale for his attack.
It seems to me that this is the inevitable result of a media environment in which it is okay to joke about assassinating a liberal candidate for the presidency, in which an extreme bigot is called kind and decent by the President and venerated in the media after his death, where a high-profile media figure explicitly identifies liberals as internal enemies, where countless slurs and attacks on left-wing views are broadcast and repeated daily.
There is a huge media machine working feverishly to create hatred towards liberals. How then can this violence really be any kind of surprise?
Dave, Urs, much love.

Its Maori Language Week again, and as always its a pleasure to see our second (of three) official language get some time in the sun. Dutiful shout-out to Maori TV, which continues to pump out great homespun programming on a ridiculously tiny budget, and has become both part of the furniture and a respected and appreciated channel even for us Pakeha. Nice one.
Student mag Salient has run its traditional issue almost entirely in Maori (next week, like every year, will be a dozen letters abusing the editors for this) and it includes a little gem of an interview with the Maori Party’s bovver boy in Parliament, Hone Harawira. (Quote sanitised so it isn’t blocked by the autofilters at some folks’ workplaces.)

It’s different here. The reason why it’s different here is that there’s not an indigenous person in the world as stroppy as your f===in Maori. Dare anybody try and ignore us mate. You know what it’s like aye? Anybody blink badly in your… f===in pound them… when I was marching aye we just wouldn’t stand for it. I’ve been to Hawaii… they’re a lovely people the Hawaiian people. I see them accept things that we wouldn’t stand for over here aye. I say, ‘…F=== me! If anybody tried that to me at home I’d f===in drop him…’

I love the New Zealand Parliament under proportional representation, I really do.
Also this week, Google is adding Maori to its display languages, alongside such other native tongues as “Klingon” and “Elmer Fudd”. I just tried to change my preferences in honour of the week but it isn’t live yet. Neato.
(And maybe next year I’ll even try to learn some reo. That’d be good.)